


The Winchester Road, [NC-17] Sam/Dean, SPN AU

by meus_venator



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Apocalypse, Bondage, Broken!Sam, Cannibalism, Dean whumpage, Dean/OMC - Freeform, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Apocalypse, R, SPN - Freeform, Sam Whumpage, Slash, Violence, Whipping, apoca!fic, evil!Sam, h/c, slave!fic, slave!sam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-24
Updated: 2012-06-24
Packaged: 2017-11-08 10:20:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/442149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meus_venator/pseuds/meus_venator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world has ended. Lucifer and his legions have moved on, their new battlefield heaven. He has left Earth a barren wasteland, he has also left behind the shattered shell that was once his vessel. This is a story of two brothers finding each other again at the end of the world and facing it’s passing together. </p><p>A tale of abiding love.</p><p>Initial concept based on the book and movie <i>The Road</i>.</p><p><b>A/N:</b> Originally posted here: <a href="http://meus-venator.livejournal.com/12300.html"><b>Winchester Road Master Post on LJ</b></a><br/>Also check out<br/><a href="/works/7769815">[Podfic] The Winchester Road | written by meus_venator</a> by <a href="/users/Tipsy_Kitty/pseuds/Tipsy_Kitty">Tipsy_Kitty</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

: : :

Sam smiled.

He hoisted the book proudly overhead, running through the hotel room, loudly proclaiming, “ _SamIAm_.” Their very own little caped crusader. He was six.

Dean had found the first copy of the book when Dean was nine and Sam was five in a cabin their father had leased for the summer. It had become Sam’s proudest possession, and he traipsed around with it under his chubby little arm from then on. The book held pride of place in Sam’s satchel in the Impala's trunk. It was only a few years later, after a fire in their hotel room set by a witch, that they realized that the book had been left behind on Sammy’s bed. It was lost.

But that first time, that first summer Dean had noticed it under the bed, overlooked and left behind by the previous occupants. When he spotted the bright colored cover curious, he had pulled it out and dusted it off. Little Sammy had been playing on the carpet nearby with some matchbox cars, and quickly abandoned them when he saw Dean crack open the red cover.

“Wead, De…” Sammy’s soft lisping baby voice ordered as he pulled himself up onto the bed beside Dean and nudged his brother’s side.

“Ah, it’s a baby book Sammy, you don’t want me to read that.” Dean had said, his vast second grade vocabulary having far outstripped the simple verse.

“Pwease De.” Sam looked up at Dean with pleading puppy dog eyes and Dean was lost.

“Sammy.” Dean rolled his eyes but obliged, scootching back on the bed, grabbing up the few pillows to lean against and patting a place beside him. The little boy curled half into Dean’s lap, and Dean had to stretch his arms to wrap around his brother and capture both edges of the book.

“Alright then. But don’t be telling anyone I read you this, okay?”

At Sam’s enthusiastic nod Dean began,

“I do not like them in a box.

I do not like them with a fox.

I do not like them in a house…”

: : :

Dean trudged down the cracked and pocked asphalt road, careful where he stepped. He squinted up at the slate grey sky. What he wouldn’t give right now for another gallon of gas and a chance to sit behind the wheel of the Impala, wind in his hair. He could imagine it so clearly: the sun on his face, feel of the steering wheel beneath his fingers, metal rock blasting in the breeze, just riding along on the open road, no destination in mind.

Instead he was picking his way carefully across the shattered remains of the road. A broken ankle, hell a sprained ankle, could mean the difference between life and death. He adjusted his pack, not that it was heavy. They were down to their last couple cans of mystery meat, the labels long since worn away. He couldn't even count on them being edible. Burned down to skin and bone as he was, almost anything rubbed and ached on him, including the packs. He glanced back and tugged gently on the rope to urge Puppy forward, so easily distracted, nose tilted toward the cold dim sun.

The world was grey now, all color sucked from it. Just as all life had been. It was eerily silent except for his soft footfalls and the occasional snuffle from Puppy. Dean moved the shotgun to his other shoulder, the weight of it bruising, too heavy to carry, too scary to leave behind, the two shells he had left a thin barrier between survival and extinction.

Was this really what Lucifer had wanted? The world a barren husk laid to ruin? Seven years he had laid waste to everything that walked, crawled, flew or struggled toward the sun, poisoned everything in his path. And now that he was done, the world was truly dying, a burnt-out ghost of its former self. Dean didn’t understand the point of it all, so much death and destruction, and what satisfaction could it bring the Morningstar? All that remained of this world was the ashes, all that was left was the dying.

Lucifer had moved on then as abruptly as he had come, and behind him he left the broken shell that used to be Dean’s brother. Used to be his Sam. The bold, stupid, crazy kid who had thought he could fight Lucifer from the inside, change his mind by saying _yes_.

He had been wrong.

 

So wrong… “Sammy,” Dean whispered the name, like a groan, loaded with regret. Puppy looked up at him, head cocked, eyes blank, and Dean grimly clamped his mouth shut and kept moving.

Dean had felt Lucie’s leaving, he thought maybe the whole world had, like the shriek of a wraith in his head, a thousand flapping wings, and then a sharp, blinding clap of pain. He could only assume the Morningstar had withdrawn to heaven to begin the second stage of his assault, his siege on God and the Angels. Man’s time, it seemed, was over. He was done with Earth, and Earth was done.

Dean had known instinctively he had little time to find the remains of Lucifer’s vessel, his Sam. He didn’t know what might be left of his brother, if anything. He had tried to keep tabs on Sam, tried to stay close to the Morningstar and his demon retinue, but times had been bad and demons plentiful, and sometimes Dean just couldn’t follow. When Lucie first took Sam over as his vessel he gave Dean a gift, or a curse – more often the latter. He became preternaturally aware of where Sam was at all times. Sam became Dean’s true north, and he could find him blindfolded. That wasn’t all: if he was close enough he could hear Sam’s thoughts, his pleas and arguments to Lucifer, trapped and shut away in a corner of the Fallen’s mind. Dean tried to reach his brother through the link. Dean was never sure if Sam could hear him. It would be just like Lucie to wall them each off and let them hear each other but never speak. So he tried to think happy thoughts at his brother every day and some days when Sam’s slow crumbling descent into madness was too much for Dean and there were too many dead and too much hurt, he sobbed Sam’s name and cursed him for a fool, for saying yes and tried to get as far away from the screams echoing in his head as he could. He hoped what was left of Sam hadn’t been listening those days.

So it wasn’t a huge surprise when Lucifer left, that the link to Sam shut down. Dean could feel the snap in his mind, like old worn elastic stretched too far, but by that time he rarely heard Sam at all any more. Mercifully he still ‘knew’ where Sam was, he still was dialed in to the angelic GPS. Maybe in some twisted way it was Lucifer’s way of making up for using Sam, turning him. Dean didn’t bother to try figure it out. He filled up the dirt bike he'd scavenged with the last few gallons of gas siphoned from the Impala and headed out cross country to retrieve his brother. He knew he’d find him in Lawrence.

He hadn’t been wrong.

 

 

He heard it in the distance, the backfire of a vehicle running on god knows kind of fuel, these days, and scanned the horizon to check if they were close enough to sight. Nothing yet, there was still some time. He tugged on the rope and scrambled to the side of the road. They needed to get to cover before whatever was on the road got close enough to see – and see them.

The irony of the dead landscape was no cover: no leaves filling out the underbrush, just scrub or branches or dead trees to hide behind, and the colors of life stood out now like a beacon in the endless grey. What Dean needed right now was a hollow, or a rock, or the burnt out remains of a car to hide behind. Instead, all he had was rolling hillside. He pulled Puppy behind him and heard the soft whimpers. “Hush, now, shhhh, we have to be quiet now, bad guys are coming. Shhhh, baby.”

Puppy looked at him with big wide eyes and followed obediently, only sniffling. Dean scrambled up an embankment by the road, a sharp jab in the heel of his left foot told him new boots had to be a priority, and soon, before winter came, before the snow fell on this grey and dying land. That was assuming they made it that long Dean thought wryly. He used a branch to obscure his footprints in the ash as he climbed up and ducked behind the mound just as the old half-ton came into view.

Ribald laughter echoed across the landscape, overloud in the silence as the old truck snorted and rumbled closer. Its paint color was indeterminate now, long scoured off by ash and flame. There were six of them. A hunter pack, human looking, but what did that mean when demons still roamed the shattered lands clothed in the suits of men? Leather, rubber and miscellaneous scraps were strapped over their bodies; they were armed with an odd assortment of rifles, machetes, and knives. Laughable Mad Max movie material if it wasn't for the fact that they were human jackals, relentless, surviving by any means and feeding on the unwary.

Dean flattened himself on his belly and crept close to the rise, watched as the truck came within feet of their hiding place. On the back of the flatbed, two men hanging off the tailgate were drinking something out of a jug and punching each other as they shared a joke. He could see a bloody tarp; he didn’t want to think what might be under it, but the celebratory tone suggested a successful hunt.

Dean had seen their kind before – cavengers. An ugly joke of a name for the new breed of scavenger cannibals that patrolled the roads, picking off the unwary. The truck lurched to a stop with an indignant sputter, and one of the men tumbled drunkenly off the running rail, mumbling. “Right back boys, gotta drain the main vein.” The man tripped on his way up the hill, landing on his face, to the laugher of his comrades, not satisfied to just piss on the side of the road. Dean’s eyes grew wide; he was coming directly toward them. He pulled on Puppy’s rope, making quiet shushing sounds as he crawled back farther into the dead forest. He hid puppy behind the remains of a shattered tree, rushing to quickly scrape up as many dead leaves as he could to cover him, and then dart for cover himself nearby. Dean had only just slid into place when the man crested the rise.

Dean eased his knife out of its sheath and carefully lowered his shotgun to the ground. Ruby's knife still drank human blood as well as any other.

The man muttered and hummed and Dean could hear him fumbling with his fly.

Just piss and leave, just piss and leave, Dean chanted in his head.

The quiet snap of a twig sounded like a thunderclap and the drunk's head swung up unerringly toward Puppy.

“Who’s there?” he called out, remnants of North Carolina in his voice. “What ch'all doin’ there? Come on out, I won’t hurtcha none.”

Dean’s heart clenched and he closed his eyes in dread when he heard a faint rustling as, trusting, Puppy peeked out cautiously from his hiding place.

The man’s head tilted and took on a covetous note, “Now what's a purdy thing like you doing here?” The drunk ambled over, tripping on his lowered pants as he tried to rebutton them, coming closer to Puppy. His voice was soft, coaxing, gentling the wild broken thing. “Why, I might even have somethin’ for ya.”

Dean risked a glance. One of the man’s dirt-encrusted hands lifted toward Puppy in entreaty while the other reached for the knife tucked at the back of his belt. Dean rose to a crouch and readied himself to launch at the man.

Puppy’s head lifted, and wide, curious eyes looked up at the man. The drunk straightened, suddenly far more sober than he’d been just a moment ago. Dean could see the black fill his eyes, and the man’s voice took on a cruel, evil tone.

“Why, if it isn’t Sam Winchester, Lucifer’s ball gown in the flesh. I do declare this was a good place to take a piss. What brings you here boy? And that means your no-account brother must be nearby, as well. Come on out and play, Dean…” The demon straightened and swung around, black gaze tracking the woods.

Dean didn’t wait, just threw. The knife sliced through the air, catching the man in the throat with a soft thunk. The demon jerked and stood there frozen for a minute; his nerveless hands twitched, dropped the knife he had hidden in his hand. Then the red burning crackle of the knife's magic had black smoke boiling up out of him on a screaming wind, and the empty shell dropped to its knees, the strings that had animated him cut. Sam looked up at the smoke bewildered, hands clamped over his ears in terror, lips parted in a silent wail of terror. When it was finally over, he hid his face in his jacket and rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet in terror.

Dean was on the demon before he tipped the rest of the way to the ground, gently lowering the body to the underbrush. Its dead eyes still fixed on Puppy. Knowing he had only seconds, Dean yanked out the demon blade, wiping the blood off on the man’s clothes, and patting him down for anything usable. Along with the man’s knife, he found a lighter with fluid still in it, and a lone bullet – by some minor miracle it looked like the right caliber for Dean’s rifle. There was a small packet of sealed matches and some meat jerky wrapped in wax paper. Dean’s gut twisted with hunger, but he left the jerky. He couldn’t lower himself to that, not yet. Not yet, not even for Sam’s sake. He heard it then, a soft whimper, and Dean looked up at the rail-thin shadow who used to be Dean’s brother. He crouched near him, rocking back and forth in agitation, the whimper elevating to quiet keening.

“Hush Sammy, There are bad men out there.”

Sam’s eyes riveted on Dean’s, confusion in the tip-tilted gaze.

“Orvis, you done there son? Just how much piss you got in ya, boy? We got to be going. Meat's gonna spoil.”

Dean’s head swung back and he cursed. He scrambled for Sam’s hand and tugged, pulling Sam deeper into the scrub, grabbing his rifle as another cavenger came to the top of the rise.

“Orvis?... Shit!” Dean could hear the other man swear and shout, “Tommy, Raz, get your asses up here, pronto. Someone’s killed Setter. We got us a hunt!” He ran faster, pulling Sam with him.

He could hear the men howl like wolves as they hurtled headlong through the woods searching for them; the clang of their machetes as they banged them against their knives. Better fed, stronger, maybe demons, Dean knew they had to keep the lead they had ahead of them – it was their only edge.

Branches and twigs caught and tore at their clothes and faces as they ran. Sam glanced behind them, wild-eyed and whimpering. Dean squeezed his hand. “Don’t worry Sammy, I gotcha.”

They slammed through the forest, all care or stealth abandoned as the cavangers closed on them steadily – and suddenly Dean was pulling them back, grabbing Sammy by the chest and swinging him bodily full circle to safety just as Sam stepped out over open space.

Panting and shaking with the rush of adrenaline, Dean crouched by the edge of the gorge they'd nearly stepped off into. Sam sprawled on the ground and, trembling with shock, clutched frantically at Dean’s leg. Dean looked down at the icy water pounding past below them, blue white with spray and foam and, by the looks of it, frigidly cold. He hadn’t even heard it as they’d approached, all he’d heard was the frantic beating of his own heart.

Dean tried to calculate if they had time to backtrack or run along the gorge’s rim, but the howls of the cavenger pack pushed him to the unthinkable.

Grimly he strapped his rifle in its case on his back and tightened the covers on each of their knapsacks, cinched his pack straps tighter, and reached over to do the same for Sam. He grabbed Sammy’s face in both his hands, forced the wild-eyed man to look at him, and said quietly, “We have to jump, Sam. They’re too close, We’ll never make it otherwise. You know how to swim; we’ll be okay, just stick together and we’ll be out of the water as soon as we can. Okay?” Dean looked hopefully at Sam, willing his brother to understand.

Sam glanced nervously back at the forest behind them, now filled with the yips and barks and howls of their pursuers, and swung round to nod at his brother solemnly. Dean grinned like a wildman and grabbed up his brother's hand. “That’s my boy. Now hold on to me, and we’ll see ya on the other side, Sammy.” They stepped off together to plunge into the water below, the shock of its frozen embrace did not disappoint.

: : :

Dean feels a cold nose nuzzling into his throat and he sits up and forward, spitting out water in painful gagging gasps. Sam is twisted round him like a pretzel, and Dean can’t help but cough and gag and spew some of the brackish fluid on their entwined bodies. Sam whines and wakes, shivering, and tries to burrow closer into their combined warmth. Dean looks around, somehow, miraculously they are alive on the banks of the river, the landscape unfamiliar. The wet, grey mud is fast leaching the heat from his body, and Dean twists to look at his shivering brother.

“Sam? Sam did you do this? Did you save us?” Dean can only remember slamming down the rapids, his hand clutching desperately at Sam’s and then suddenly at rocks, and then hurt, and slipping under, lungs gasping for air.

“Was that you, Sam?” Dean’s voice is hoarse from coughing up his lungs, and Sam blinks at him blankly, a low hum in his throat. Dean reaches over to his brother and pulls him in close, wrapping his arms around the cold and trembling man, hugging him tight. “Oh Sam, Sammy.” Dean squints around at the hills above them, scanning the ridge line. He has no idea where they are, but right now there seem to be no pursuers. He cocks an ear but hears nothing and, turning back to Sam, allows a relieved smile to play over his face.

“Hear that Sam? Do ya? That’s the sound of success! We did it, Sammy boy. We did it.” Dean ruffles Sam’s wet hair and feels another shiver run through his brother’s body. The chatter of Dean’s own teeth reminds him they may have survived the water, but if they don’t find shelter quickly they are both dead men. Out here in the open, they are sitting ducks for whatever else may be traveling in the woods today.

“Okay, let's get our asses moving and find us some cover before we freeze to death.” Dean knows it is only a matter of time before their core body temperature dips too low in the wet clothes. Without shelter and heat, nightfall could mean their end.

He helps haul his gigantor brother to his feet, and checks to see that the laces of his sneakers are still securely tied. Through some freak of luck they still have their packs attached to their backs, sodden through though they might be, and Dean breathes out a sigh of relief. One thing at a time. Now, shelter.

Luck smiles on them, and they find a cave a short distance from the river. Dry and abandoned and, thanks to a slight turn in the cave's entrance, shielded from the outside. It makes Dean confident they can safely light a fire here. Night is falling, and now in this grey twilight world it happens fast. Their biggest priority now is to get dry and warm.

Dean bites his lip. In better days he would've sent Sammy out for wood while he set up camp and started to dry their clothes, but he can’t risk that now. Not with Puppy Sam.

So he dumps their packs and strips off Sam’s sodden jacket. Sam whimpers but allows Dean to do this. Then he makes Sam take off his shirt and pants. The night air is icy on their wet skin and Dean tries with trembling hands to work fast to wring as much water as he can out of their clothes and blankets. Shivering, Sam hops from one foot to the other until he can climb back into his still-wet clothes. Dean lays everything else from their packs flat on the cave floor, trying to dry it all out as much as possible.

He can hear Sam’s teeth chattering, and his panicked whimper. He looks around, and Sam is digging through his pack to bring out his treasure, the one thing Sam resolutely refuses to leave behind, his book. Dean can hear his brother's hitched, worried breath as he gently pulls it from the knapsack. Dean pinches the bridge of his nose, a headache of massive proportions looming. He sighs and drops the piece of clothing he is trying to strangle water out of and steps over to his brother. He digs deep for reserves of calm as he sees Sam rocking back and forth, the soggy book grasped in his big hands.

“Sam. Sam, here, let me.” Dean reaches over gently, waits until Sam lifts his eyes up toward him, hazel confusion and fear. “It’ll be okay, just, just don’t touch it till it has a chance to dry.” Dean carefully reaches for the book, and Sam bites his lip, but reluctantly releases it into Dean’s care. Dean stands it up on a rock where the fire will be and, turning to Sam says, “We just can’t touch it now or we’ll spoil the pages. Once we get the fire going it will dry out and it will be as right as rain. You just have to be patient, okay? We just have to go find some firewood now to help make it better.”

He steels his heart to push his brother just that bit more, tugs gently on his hand, and together the two Winchester brothers move out into the gloom to start their search. Sam stops suddenly, holding his sides shivering, full body tremors running through him. Dean winds his arm around his waist and coaxes him forward, “Come on Sam, have to keep moving, big guy.” Sam clutches Dean’s hand and lets himself be pushed forward.

: : :

The fire is burning weakly, who would have figured that in this new world, dead dry wood wouldn’t burn well? It was as if Lucie sucked all the life out of everything in his passing, and nothing burns like it used to. The flames glow weakly, but even the small amount of heat they gives off warms them. Bright pink spots have appeared on Sam’s cheeks and Dean is sure the same is true of him. Now that the fire is going, they've both stripped down to their ragged underwear, and they huddle in an improvised landscape of lean-to sticks and drying clothes that circle the fire and reflect the heat blissfully inward. The two men crouch beside each other knocking boney knees and shoulders; the heat feels like heaven on Dean’s icy skin. He wraps his hands around Sam’s shoulders and tries to rub feeling into his brother’s cold flesh. Dean can feel Sam’s trembling soften as the flames finally gain strength.

Sam’s eyes are glued to the drying book and Dean is relieved to see the pages starting to separate on their own. He goes over to it and, testing its dampness, decides it’s time to gently coax the pages apart before they become solid paper mache. He leaves the book standing on its warm rock, each individual page fanned out to catch the heat. It looks good, the colors are still bright and the images readable. Dean is sure the paper will be a bit the worse for wear, but it’s not ruined. He smiles at Sam and returns to sit beside him. His fingers graze over his brother's shoulder, rubs at a dirty spot just behind Sam’s ear. Sam wiggles and dips his head, leaning into Dean like the wriggling puppy Dean thinks of him as these days.

“Too bad we didn’t have some soap while we were in there today, eh Sammy-boy? 'cause I think someone forgot to wash behind their ears,” Dean wisecracks, resting his own head against Sam’s. Both of them are streaked with dirt, long ground in. Sam’s long, beautiful neck is grimy, his hair still greasy and lank, much like Dean’s own, only the shortness of Dean’s hiding it better. Their recent dip only scraped off the top layer of grime accumulated from weeks of life on the road.

It's then Dean absently remembers his one carefully hoarded bar of soap. But now isn’t the time. Maybe tomorrow if things are safe, if it’s relatively warm, if, if, maybe. To wash themselves and their clothes – a luxury they can seldom indulge, as it leaves them too vulnerable to predators. Dean’s hands move down to cup his brother’s shoulder again, pulling him in tighter to his gradually warming body and Dean mourns the fact he can feel every bone under his brother’s skin. Sam is a pale shadow of himself, they both are.

“So Sam, I wonder what’s for dinner. Finally find out what’s in those last few cans, huh?” Dean starts to rise but Sam snakes out an arm around Dean’s waist and holds him tight. Sam shakes his head, snuffles and tugs Dean down to lie beside him by the fire.

“Yeah, I hear ya big guy. I’m a bit tired myself. Hold that thought for a minute, though.” Dean throws a good amount of their scavenged wood on the fire and tugs down one of the almost dry blankets from its impromptu drying rack. He parachutes the blanket out over both of them and can see Sam’s fond delighted smile as it drops down over them. It captures some of the heat of the fire in its folds as it comes to rest, and Dean can hear Sam’s contented sigh. He tucks Sam’s head onto his shoulder and rubs a hand through his nearly dry hair, massaging his scalp. Sam hums in approval.

He blows out a breath. He can’t believe how lucky they were today. He tries to think of better ways to keep Sam safe in the future, ways to guard against something like this happening again, but exhaustion tugs him under, and he curls into his brother’s back, arm wrapping itself protectively around Sam’s waist in his sleep. Dean doesn’t dream.

: : :

The second time they found the book they were in a town somewhere in the Midwest, Furling, or Furlong… it was hard to read the sign anymore.

Dean had scouted and surveilled the town for two days before he deemed it safe enough to enter. It was one of the few free barter towns to have sprung up in the new economy. A chance for Dean to swap out things he’d found for things they needed to survive. Dean was haggling with the proprietor of a food stall over 8 spare cans of tuna he’d found in an abandoned country store. He and Sam were sick to death of tuna, and Dean was trying to swap them out for some beef stew or chili.

Sam had stood behind Dean, the rope tethering them together trailing on the ground. The small, ragged teddy bear Dean had found for him held tight to his chest, while he gazed longingly at it.

On the other side of the sawhorse and planks displaying their few wares, the little girl clutched the book tight to her chest and watched the teddy bear with wide, wanting eyes.

Dean glanced back at Sam and saw his brother’s enraptured expression. He followed his sightline to the little girl and ducked his head to hide the grin that wanted to spread across his face at the sight.

“Hey Mister, I’ll settle for 6 cans of chili in place of the tuna if your daughter would consider a trade – the bear for the book? I think they’d both consider it a fair swap.” Dean gestured toward his brother and the little girl, his lopsided grin showing the merchant he meant no harm.

“Sara, you’re not supposed to be out here. Honey, you have to stay in the house, it’s not safe.” The trader whispered anxiously at this daughter.

“But poppa, look at the bear!” the hopeful lisping voice stage whispered back as she wrapped herself around her father’s leg.

“Would you be okay to trade your book for the nice man’s bear?”

A silent nod, and large eyes looked way, way up as Sam shuffled closer.

Sam looked at Dean and after exchanging a careful look with the trader nodded at his brother.

Sam knelt down so he was eye level with the little girl. He took one more longing look at the book and then at his bear. The bear was black and white, a panda, and Dean had called it Jefferson. Sam rubbed a big hand gently over the bears head and gave it a kiss on the forehead before extending it to the little girl.

Sara crept out from behind her father’s leg and gently took the bear and, squeezing it tight in one arm, awkwardly aimed the book she held under the other arm toward Sam, giving him permission to take it. He did, clasping it tight to his chest and breathed in deep. When he opened his eyes, they were lit by a blissful, grateful look.

Sara lisped, “What’s his name, mister?” Sam looked over at Dean, and Dean shrugged and squirmed a bit and said, “Ah, his name is Jefferson.”

“That’s a funny name.” Sara giggled, a light tinkling sound, “Come on Jefferson, let’s have tea.”

Dean pretended not to notice when the man scrubbed a tear from his eye and stuffed seven cans of chili in their sack.

“You have a beautiful daughter sir.” Dean said, nodding as they started to leave.

“Keep her safe.”

 

That night at their fire after a bowl of chili each they curled up together and Dean had read…

“I do not like them in a box.

I do not like them with a fox.

I do not like them in a house.

I do not like them with a mouse.

I do not like them here or there.

I do not like them anywhere.

I do not like green eggs and ham.

I do not like them, Sam I am.”

“Sam I am. That’s you Sammy.” Dean punched Sam’s far too thin arm, a playful smirk on his face. Sam looked up, the sharp bones of his cheeks lit by the firelight, a soft smile creeping over his normally blank features before fading into cautious neutrality.

Dean sucked in a breath. Sam. It had just been for a second, but Sam had been there.

: : :


	2. The Winchester Road

 

  


 

: : :

It’s miserably cold and Sam is coughing. Bruising, hacking coughs that make Dean’s chest ache just listening to it. It's a harsh reminder they didn’t get off completely Scott free from their recent swim. The new town they’d stumbled across seems deserted. Dean watched it for hours before anxiety and Sam’s continued coughing forced him to break protocol and enter the town limits sooner than he likes. It seems deserted, but nothing is for sure these days. It reminds Dean of another town they’d watched that seemed safe.

: : :

_They’ve been on the road a long time now and their supplies are dwindling. Dean spots smoke from a nearby town and decides they needed to risk going in. He looks through his knapsack to see what they can afford to trade for food and water purification pellets. The old army issue tablets are like gold these days, the rain falling from the sky is contaminated and the brooks and streams deadly without boiling which is another whole chore in itself. They need the pills and they need food and Dean can’t leave Sam behind._

_He watches through his binoculars for a couple of hours; it’s not a cavanger trap or slave station. So far it seems to be just as advertised, a rough trading town, no better or worse than most. Dean tucks away the glasses and reaches down to help tug Sam to stand beside him. Sam had been mumbling softly to himself as he rocked beside Dean, running the little matchbox car Impala Dean had found somewhere up and down the sleeve of his jacket, making vroom-vroom sounds. Big eyes intent, looking into the Impala’s little interior._

_Dean attaches the rope around his and Sammy’s waists and they walk into town, the slate grey sky solemn above them._

_“No kid, I don’t need any, ya got anything else?” Dean puts away the few cans of mystery meat they’d gotten in the last abandoned house they found. This is the third stall they’ve visited, with no luck. Places like this didn’t like mystery cans. They had reputations to maintain, they need the labels on, and for all Dean knows the cans could have snails in them, or ptomaine poisoning. Welcome to the atomic age._

_Dean licks his lips and glances around at his and Sam’s packs, picking through his mental inventory for anything they might have of value to the man. He happens to dart a glance up at the vendor and sees that look in his eye and he swallows. The man’s in his fifties, well built, lean, like they all are these days, a few inches taller than Dean, broader, greyer. If Dean squints – and he really doesn’t want to think this – the guy looks a bit like his dad, salt n’ pepper beard, broad shoulders. Jesus._

_Dean packed that tidbit away, he didn’t need to be thinking about his dad right now, didn’t need to think about the disapproval or the disgust he’d see in his father’s face if he could see him now. He just has to concentrate on keeping himself and Sammy alive. Sam stands there, oblivious, watching the light catch a seashell wind chime the merchant has hanging from one strut of his awning._

_“Well kid?” The man says not unkindly, but obviously growing impatient._

_Dean looks up at the man and swallows, moistens his lips a bit and starts, “Ahh… I-I…” Dean can’t force himself to say it so he simply raises his shirt to show the taut smooth skin of his belly and chest, rubs his hand across his chest._

_Finally chokes out, “I can make it good for you mister…”_

_Dean drops his head, ashamed and waits for the man to turn him down and wave him and his brother away._

_There is a long pause and Dean starts to turn to go, not looking up, when the man’s gruff voice stops him._

_“One fuck, 10 pills. You make it a pair and bring your boyfriend in on it and I’ll make it 15.”_

_Dean’s head snaps up in surprise. The merchant is looking around the market checking out how busy it is right now. It’s not. There’s only two stalls open and no customers. The man won’t lose business while he’s fucking Dean._

_Dean doesn’t want to queer the deal, but Sam’s involvement is NOT on the table. “Make it 15, and you can have me all night.”_

_“The 10 is for all night kid. Hell, I can get a good blow job for half a can of cat food these days. You gotta work for these babies.”_

_Dean looks down at the ground and bites his lip. He really has no choice. They’ll be travelling cross country, and they need safe water. “All right. But him, he’s my brother and he’s – he’s a little simple. He’s off the table. ”_

_“K’ sure, whatever you say, kid. We’ll take this out here, in the back.”_

_Dean tugs on the rope and Sam looks over, a bright smile on his face as he looks down from the chimes to Dean, dimples appearing, smile warmer than the sun now. Dean can’t help but smile back, bittersweet. He tugs on the rope gently. “Come on Sammy, over here, man.”_

_The vendor furtively looks around and begins to roll down the jury-rigged blankets that pass as blinds for his stall, packs away his goods pretty efficiently. He thrusts an old milk crate full of tins into Dean arms and says, “Carry that to the back, will ya.”_

_Dean quirks a brow, he didn’t exactly sign up as a hired hand, but he needs the tablets and the guy hasn’t really been a dick so far. He picks up the milk crate with a grunt of effort and threads his way past the table, through the curtains into a little cordoned off stockroom at the back, and sets the crate down, Sam trailing behind him every step on the rough rope lead. Dean quickly unties the rope from around his waist and points to the corner. “Go have a seat over there, okay Sammy? We’ll be here for a while.” He kisses Sam’s neck as he sits and pats his head reassuringly._

_Two more trips later along with the merchant and the stall's emptied out for the night and it’s beginning to get dark. The vendor calls out to the stall next to him, “Marge, keep an eye out, will ya? I’m shuttin’ down early today.”_

_“Sure thing, Edgar.” Dean hears. So Edgar, Edgar is the man he has to fuck to keep them alive._

_It’s not like Dean hasn’t done this before. It’s been a long, dark road since the world went to shit. And even before that, there’d been times growing up when their dad had left him and Sammy alone in some one-horse town for too long and their money had run out, and Dean had done what he had to in order to survive. He’d given his first blow job when he was 13, right around Sam’s birthday. Their dad had been gone for three weeks and all they had left in the cupboards was one box of cornflakes for two growing boys. Dean had choked and swallowed the man down as best he could, and when the man tossed the twenty dollar bill on the alley floor in front of him as he sputtered and gasped for breath afterward, Dean had fell a wave of relief wash over him. He felt that way now._

_Dean twitches as the large hand of the vendor falls suddenly on his shoulder._

_“Strip,” the man orders gruffly as he bends to light a small lantern in the dark enclosed space._

_“Pills first.” Dean forces himself to say through gritted teeth. He can’t afford to get screwed over on this. It's too important._

_The man shrugs and turns, rooting through the small stack of extra inventory on the storeroom shelves. He comes out with an orange plastic pharmacy bottle and shakes it before Dean’s eyes._

_“Now show me the goods, pretty boy. Gonna fuck you raw.”_

_Dean swallows and starts to strip off his coat and outer shirt. He begins to pull his t-shirt up over his head when out of the corner of his eye he sees Sam watching him, eyes wide and frightened. Dean moves quickly over to his brother and kneels down by him. Sam ducks his head down between his knees and begins to rock, Sam’s classic show of agitation. Dean raises his head to the heavens and for just a moment wishes there were any other way, wishes he was living any other life – but he isn’t. He licks his lips and clears his face of anything but calm acceptance and reaches out and lifts Sam’s head in his two hands, forcing his brother to look at him. “Sam. Sammy, listen to me. I have to do this man a favor, and I want you to sit here in the corner and look the other way, okay? I want you to read your book and not look back.” Sam nods and stretches his head sideways to peek over Dean’s shoulder at the merchant, eyes wide. He swallows and nods vaguely at Dean then reaches obediently behind him and takes off his backpack and pulls out his big red book._

_The merchant, Edgar, is busy tidying up. He clears off the sleeping bag he has rolled out on the floor; the man obviously lives and works here to protect his goods. He coughs a bit and Dean turns, apology already on his lips as he starts to lift the t-shirt up to take it all the way off. “Coming, sorry,” he murmurs, suddenly ashamed._

_“No kid. Here, for your brother.” Edgar throws Dean two small items. One turns out to be a bright red sucker still in its clear cellophane wrapper, and the other a small shrink wrap package of earplugs like the ones you used to get on a plane._

_Dean looks over at the man, grateful tears pricking the corners of his eyes. “Thanks, man.”_

: : :

_Dean gets Sam situated, smiles softly as he sees Sam enthusiastically licking the treat. He swallows down his nervousness, quickly toeing off his boots and socks before he turns back toward the merchant. He strips off his shirt in a slow, teasing way he’s seen the girls in the strip clubs do it. Edgar’s been good to him, he wants to make it good for him. He slowly slips his baggy jeans down over his too-skinny legs in what he hopes is a sinuous move. He tosses his head and licks his lips provocatively. He’s been told often enough he has cock sucker lips, tonight he’ll put them to use. He slips his ragged boxers down and stands as provocatively as he can manage in the lamplight, and if his cock isn’t showing much interest in the proceedings at least he’s doing his best, showing his best moves. It’s been a while._

_He moves toward Edgar like a cat toward a mouse, eyes predatory and hungry, and in one graceful move, he slips to his knees at Edgar’s feet. His head is bowed, his hands behind his head in submission. He feels Edgar take both Dean's hands in his. Edgar’s a big guy, with extra inches and muscle on him. If he wants to he can hurt Dean bad. Dean feels a tremor of fear run through him, and he tries to still it. Edgar holds his hands in one meaty paw, and Dean can feel the man’s eyes on him, but he can’t look up. The man turns his wrists up, soft underparts exposed, and he feels the soft press of lips on each wrist as the man kisses them softly and releases them._

_“So beautiful.” The man whispers and pulls Dean gently to his feet. “But that’s not how I want you, kid. I want it good for both of us.” Dean is still slightly dazed when Edgar’s head dips down to kiss him._

: : :

_Edgar gets his money’s worth. Dean is on his knees for the third time that night, Edgar rocking into him. For an old guy he’s got endurance. Dean grunts as Edgar slams in particularly hard. “Hang on,” Edgars whispers suddenly and pulls out of Dean, flipping him onto his back on the bedroll, rearranging and bending his knees up against his chest so Dean is folded up like a pretzel before he thrusts back in with a grunt. Edgar stares down at Dean as he fucks into him, one hand gently running through Dean’s hair. Dean unconsciously leans into Edgars open palm, savoring the moment of tenderness. Edgar's hand reaches down to stroke Dean’s cock crushed between them, his hand gathering some of the pre-come drooling steadily from the tip and stripping its length. Dean feels his cock filling again; feels the man’s thumb rolling back over the fat head of his dick, rubbing into the slit, coaxing him to hardness. It’s a little like being loved._

_Edgar leans down to kiss him, and Dean has to close his eyes. Has to pretend it’s other lips than these seeking entrance, someone else's tongue licking into him. He swallows and glances over at Sam as soon as Edgar lifts his head, sighing in relief when he sees Sam is curled up asleep around his book, Edgar’s earplugs still safely nestled in his ears. Dean turns back to business and arches up as Edgar deliberately searches for that place inside him, sending sparks sizzling up Dean’s spine. It’s been so long, and Dean’s been so very much alone, carrying the burden of their safety. He looks up into Edgar’s eyes and just lets himself be cherished for this short time. Edgar thrusts in several more times, rhythm growing erratic, and Dean can feel the man stiffen and arch into him, feel his seed jetting deep into his bowels. The man’s hands tighten and Dean’s slowly wound spring hitches and uncoils bursts of ropy come streaming over his chest and under his chin, covering Edgar’s hand. Dean sags back onto the bedroll. His legs may be cramping and his chest a wet mess, but Dean is floating somewhere safe and far away. Just for this little time._

_They fuck again in the morning, Edgar taking him gentle and slow, face down on the soiled sleeping bag. Dean comes again without being touched and Edgar licks and sucks at Dean’s swollen lips._

_Dean tries to clean up as best he can before waking Sammy. Tucks himself in and gets dressed, tender and sore from Edgar's use of him. The man starts breakfast and Dean, stomach rumbling, tries to hurry Sam awake, tucking his book away and removing the earplugs, trying to rush him out of the lean-to before the smell of cooking food drives him completely insane._

_Edgar calls out, “breakfast's ready boys.” And Dean’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise: food is another commodity with a price._

_“Edgar… what do I owe you man… I-I.” Edgar waves a hand away as Dean starts to lift his shirt up again. “Nah, sit down. I had a good time last night, you earned it, kid.”_

_Dean chuckles in relief; his ass is really sore. He looks up at Edgar, eyes bright, “Thanks, I- we appreciate it.”_

_Sam hunkers down by the warmth of the little fire place Edgar has set up in one corner of the lean-to, and they each savor the succulent aroma of the fried spam Edgar serves up. Afterward Sam licks his fingers repeatedly like a small child, getting every last morsel of grease off his fingers and smiling like it was Christmas._

_“You make a mean breakfast, Edgar. And I gotta say, for an old man you got staying power.”_

_Edgar laughs and shakes a little bottle of blue pills he pulls out of his pocket. “Well, let's just say I came prepared.” Dean snorts. Of course._

_They hear a sudden ruckus outside and Dean’s head swivels round. Edgar grabs up his rifle and Dean brings out his revolver, looking over Edgars shoulder, as Edgar opens up a little latched window in the side of the lean-to. They watch as a group of men walk into town shoving over stalls, guns locked and loaded. Dean thinks he sees a flash of black in their eyes._

_“Let’s get out of here, Edgar,” Dean whispers. The man’s been decent to them, to him, kind when he could have been cruel. Dean doesn’t want to see him hurt._

_“No, you go. I gotta protect my inventory. There’s an exit out the back, leads to an alley, lots of places to hide and easy to get out of town."_

_“Come with us. This stuff, it’s not worth dying over, Edgar. Please.” Dean pleads. Sam stands agitated by their arguing._

_Edgar shakes his head and waves Dean off, and Dean has Sam to worry about. He quickly ties the rope back around his waist and makes sure Sam’s pack is secured and nothing's left behind. He pockets the pills and nods and they dart out the back._

: : :

_Dean watches from the cover of the woods, Sam shivering at his feet, as the town burns._

_Afterward, after the screams have stopped and the demons are gone, Dean removes the plugs again from Sam’s ears. They pick through the debris. The town is in ruins. They find Edgar’s mauled body, a bullet hole through his head. Dean wraps him in his sleeping bag and they stand over him. Sam has somehow unearthed the broken and battered remains of the little shell wind chime and lays it over Edgar’s shroud as Dean says a few words. They scavenge what they can, what the demons have left – which isn’t much – and light the little stall on fire. Dean wishes he had the strength to bury Edgar, carry his body to the woods and do a proper funeral. But night is falling and Dean has no strength, and he hopes Edgar will forgive him, wherever he is now._

: : :

Dean has been desperately searching through the picked-over racks. Winter is upon them, and Sam’s too big to fit into most clothes at the best of times, let alone the limited leftovers of apocalypse shopping. Giving up on the open floor, Dean tugs the rope and leads Sam back into the storeroom. His gut clenches and his shotgun is cocked and ready. He hates dark enclosed spaces, worse than when he was a hunter, but he has to go back there; it’s the last store in this one-horse town they’ve stumbled onto. No Wal-Mart this, but smaller, safer. Dean prefers to steer clear of the larger centers; there's likely more competition for food and resources there, and Dean's got Sam to look out for. Dim light filters in from the surprisingly unbroken windows high above the stockroom floor, and Dean starts to comb through boxes looking for anything that was overlooked.

Everything is dirty with a layer of dust and damp in the unheated building, but dust is good, dust means no one has been here in a while, and Dean concentrates on searching while Sam idly pushes a roller blade back and forth on the concrete floor, brow wrinkled in concentration as he marvels at the smooth flow of the wheels on the even surface. He lifts the rollerblade up to show it to Dean, a shy smile on his face, just as Dean cuts open a box in the back corner of the room. Yahtzee! Winter parkas, men’s, unopened. Dark blues and greens, though at this point Dean wouldn’t care if they were pink, as long as they were warm. Dean looks up and whoops in glee. Sam startles and drops his roller blade in surprise.

“Hey, it’s okay. Com'ere, I found us something.“ Dean tugs off the ratty remains of Sam’s fall jacket and begins to pull bulky shrink wrapped packets from the box. His eyes widen and he whistles when he spots a double-x tall and rips it from its plastic wrapper.

“Here, try it on, Sammy. I think it’s got your name on it.”

Sam’s arm slides tentatively into the new jacket, reverently touching the soft new material of its waterproof outer shell. Dean bows his head for a moment as relief washes over him. He looks up, and he can feel the tears sparking in the corners of his eyes. Sam would be warm this winter. Sam might live through this winter. It's seldom he even considers further into the future than camp tonight, surviving one minute, one hour, one day at a time, or possibly tomorrow. The prospect of keeping Sam alive through the desolate cold and snowy months is the first hope he's allowed himself.

  
Sam stands proudly, shyly rubbing the new material with his hand, a dark blue that brings out that color in his prismatic eyes. Dean digs into the box for himself and brings out an olive green version a size smaller. He holds it up to his chest and says, “So what do you think, Sam? Pretty stylin’ huh? Have to look good for the ladies.” Sam looks at Dean blankly, happily petting his soft jacket.

With Sam now huddled in warm layers, drawing in his journal in the corner, Dean continues to go through the back room and makes surprising discoveries in the darker corners, new jeans and corduroy pants for each of them, windbreakers for the rain, and soft flannel shirts. Dean even found an overlooked stash of men’s underwear. The bounty leaves Dean’s head spinning, and he never thought he was the weepy type, but his voice gets gruffer as the finds stack up. They are only limited by how much they can carry. New backpacks stuffed with bounty and some extra for trade, Dean decides they’ve pushed their luck long enough staying in one place, and its time to hit the road.

On the way out of the storeroom, Dean sees a red glint as the sun comes out for a brief appearance from behind the gloom and bright rays hit the side of a machine in a small back room. Curious, Dean peers around the corner. It’s the staff lounge, a shoebox- sized area, and there’s a coke machine in the corner.

“So what’re the chances, huh Sammy?” Dean flips open his jackknife and jostles open the door to the machine. The door pops open way too easily and inside, the machine is stripped bare, its racks empty. Then Dean sees it – a lone can of Coke Classic left at the back. It’s stuck in the mechanism and that's no doubt why it’s still in the machine. Dean uses his knife to lever it out of the metal struts and pops the can free.

He holds it up in front of his face and licks his lips.

“Well there we have it, Sammy, the pinnacle of man’s achievement, right up there with cheeseburgers and air conditioning: the last can of pop in the world.” Dean knows his rambling conversation isn’t returned by Sam, maybe not even appreciated, but he hopes some of it penetrates the broken shards of Sam’s mind, and in the awful silence, talking helps keep Dean sane. Maybe one day Sam will even answer him.

Sam looks on bemused and brings his red book out of his pack, holding it up to the pop can in comparison and Dean smiles, “Yup, if it’s big and it’s red, it’s good. Keep your fingers crossed, Sammy boy.” Dean pops the top and the faint sugary fizz of bubbles floats up through the air. Sam’s eyes widen in surprise and his nose wrinkles at the sensation. Dean holds out the drink first to Sammy. Sam licks his dry lips and Dean makes a note to see if there is any lip balm left at the rifled-over front cash. Sam takes his first sip and Dean finds he is holding his breath, waiting for… he wasn't sure what.

When Sam’s eyes widen and he takes another long gulping drink from the can Dean can see his Adam’s apple bobbing enthusiastically. When he finishes and wipes his mouth with his hand with a resounding, smacking, “Ahhh,” his eyes are sparkling with glee and there is a blush on his overheated cheeks. Dean feels as if the sun has come out for the first time in a long time. Sam offers him the can and Dean waves it away, too happy watching Sam enjoy the rare treat. “Nah, you have it, bitch.” In his mind Dean hears Sam’s soft rebuttal, but in reality he is left with only a bemused childlike hum.

: : :

_It was the first thing he saw as he approached the broken down factory complex; a warning to all. Even this far away Dean gagged and covered his nose from the stench of blood and rotting meat._

_He hung there from the chain link fence like a broken marionette, blood leaking from the many wounds. The ubiquitous trench coat, no longer pristine, still hung in tatters from his body; the tie sloppy and loose still lay around the neck of the angel’s torn shirt. His head was bowed, the cornflower blue eyes closed, but Dean could mark the tremors running through his tormented form. Manacles marked with strange runes, Enochian maybe, bound the angel’s wrists and ankles, and chains stretched him cruelly spread eagle, highlighting an unfamiliar sigil carved into the flesh of his chest. His tattered wings laced to the fence with razor wire._

_Dean had only ever briefly seen Cas’s wings, but the beautiful blue-black feathers were dirty now with ash and gore, the magnificent spans broken and brutalized, empty patches and white juts of bone in their ruffled folds, one wing bent haphazard and wrong. Both were held pinned in place on the fence by what looked like wire shoved into his flesh and threaded back into the chain link. A sad puddle of feathers listed back and forth in the wind at the angel’s feet._

_He saw Castiel blink, and his horror grew as the angel raised his head and looked directly at Dean, gouged-out ruin where cornflower blue had been. The slight wind carried the gravelly whisper to his ear, “Deeaaann.” Dean turned away, heaving, losing what little breakfast he'd had in violent spasms, clenching, retching until he was empty and spent, on the ground shuddering in reaction and gasping shallowly for breath. He gazed up into the flat grey sky and marveled at the cruelty in the world. He could be grateful he'd been hidden in the hills above the factory when he'd realized who it was pinned to the gate. This was not an auspicious beginning to his rescue of Sam. If this is what they had done to Castiel, what horrors had they wreaked on Lucifer's former vessel?_

_Dean rose on shaky knees, and peered at his friend. Castiel’s head had fallen back onto his chest. Dean slumped back on his heels, Castiel’s presence here complicated thinauschgs: he now had not one, but two rescues to perform. He started to work on a plan._

: : :


	3. The Winchester Road

 

  


  


: : :

_He had watched the area the entire cold drizzly day, scouted the factory complex’s perimeter for weak spots and the best place of entry. He peered through his binoculars and watched the changing guard, noting the placement of their barracks and where the mess hall appeared to be located, watched the change of shifts. The camp was made up of a collection of a few small outbuildings and several three- and four-story warehouse buildings. He could see demons patrolling back and forth inside the compound. No sign of Sam yet, but he thought he might have spotted their leader, a large burly man with jet black hair. He’d watched him briefing a group of men when an old army truck with a tarp on the back drove up to the gate and its contents were unloaded. A coffle of human slaves were turned over to the demons within the compound by the drivers, and were herded with cattle prods into one of the bigger buildings._ _Dean wondered what the purpose of having slaves here could be: were they being sold for profit? Or given in return for favors or concessions from the local governing bureaucrats? Or – any number of uses, Dean thought, in post-Lucifer times_ _._

_He waited for dark to make his move,_ _but when sunset came, the screaming started. He was sickened, but sadly not entirely surprised. He would have appreciated the time to watch longer, to learn and understand the rhythms and motives of the site's occupants. But that wasn’t possible. He didn’t know how much time Sam had left. And Cas – Dean rubbed at his brow, and wished, not for the first nor the last time that there was backup, that Bobby was here, or Dad._ __

_He stashed his few supplies out of sight, ready for quick retrieval and covered the bike with branches and leaves. He loaded up his pearl-handled gun, not sure how much good it would do, but there might be a human servant or two in the mix it could bring down, and slid Ruby’s knife into its sheath. Among the stash of supplies he’d brought when he emptied the Impala of anything he could carry had been set of wire cutters, they would come in handy._

_He waited till the patrol had gone by, then finished cutting a small opening and slid in through the fence. He hid the cutters under the overhang of a building – he would need them later. He stopped himself from approaching the angel: time for that after he'd saved his brother. His first priority had to be Sam._

_Dean reconned the outer buildings and found what he was after. Couldn’t actually believe it had been that easy, that the demons had left it unguarded, but given how few people were left in the world these days, who else but a Winchester would waste their remaining days going up against a demon enclave?_

_After completing his task he decided to start his search for Sam with the obvious, and slipped into the largest of the factory buildings. He crept along a grubby, dilapidated corridor, toward the sound of music and laughter coming from one end of the voluminous building. Dean entered the main plant; metal ladders and walkways rose up through the four stories, a labyrinthine network of pipes surrounding a turbine, and a floor full of heavy machines. He took to the catwalks and sought a higher level. Moving stealthily in the shadows till he was perched catlike several stories above the festivities. Dean searched the crowd trying to spy Sam through the flickering firelight and torches lighting up the floor. He saw a giant fire in one corner with a spit and something roasting over it turned by a near naked youth chained to a pipe by the fire. Dean dropped his eyes at the curiously man-shaped outlines of the cooking meat. The coffled humans had been separated from each other and divided up among their captors and were now the playthings of demons. Many were already dead. He saw one human male spread out on a long wooden table, knives shoved through his hands and feet pinning him to its surface while a demon, black eyes flashing, rutted into him. He saw a woman still alive hung from a hook, her skin slowly being peeled from her body as more demons stood around and snacked on her raw flesh while she screamed. All around were scenes of screaming tormented flesh and Dean felt his guts lurch ominously and was glad he hadn’t eaten since first setting eyes on Cas. His gaze kept traveling over the crowd and his heart stopped when he finally saw him._

_The demon leader had just entered the space surrounded by a group of laughing cohorts. He pulled on a chain dragging the reluctant collared man on all fours behind him. The man was a painfully thin, red stripes and bruises covered his body and his shaggy overlong hair hid his face, but Dean knew that form, that head._

_Sam._

_There were manacles on his brother’s hands and the dark glint of a heavy iron collar on his neck. The leader jerked the chain and laughed when Sam was flung face forward to the ground at the demon’s feet. With a snap of the leader's fingers five demons rushed forward and grabbed Sam up. Dean rose, ready to swing down like Tarzan on a kamikaze run, but quickly got a firm hold on his reactions. If Dean were captured it would do neither of them any good. He watched as Sam struggled uselessly, severely outnumbered, and they carried him behind the leader's chair. They attached a chain to the manacles on his feet and began to hoist him, full length, upside down into the air. The chains on his feet ran through a loop at the top of a beam and Dean winced as Sam’s full weight hung from his ankles. He didn’t realize the full awful significance of what the demons were doing until they finished with his hands and stepped back. Sam’s body lay hanging full length, his chained hands outstretched following the lines of the inverted cross._

_The leader approached him a satisfied chuckle leaving his lips at it reached down and ruffled Sam’s hair roughly, fondled his bare chest and tweaked his nipples. He ran his hand possessively along Sam’s body, coming to rest on his crotch, slipping beneath the ragged briefs that were his only clothing to fondle the reluctant squirming man. Dean could see Sam’s fear-glazed eyes, and he jerked in recoil when he realized they’d gagged him, the red ball clearly visible even across the room. Dean played out a small fantasy in his head where he had the Colt and enough bullets to put all of these monsters down but that’s all it was. He knew he could never take them all on head on. He swallowed his rage and crept closer to his brother in readiness._

_The leader picked up a whip and sprawled in a lounge chair, his new world throne positioned just in front of Sam. He ran his fingers caressingly through the well worn straps of the whip, a dark unreadable look on his face as he watched Sam twist and moan softly from his cross. The look on the leader’s face and his sudden jerk out of his seat when the explosion happened cheered Dean’s heart. He allowed himself a tight feral smile of satisfaction as the leader roared in anger, barking orders at his crew. Demons tripped over themselves in their hurry to exit the room, leaving only the slave and tormented behind._

_As soon as the last demon ran out the door Dean shimmied down a nearby pipe and landed in a crouch beside Sam, glancing quickly around to see if he’d been noticed. There were no guards left and all the other slaves in the room were either incapable of movement or had run to the nearby windows to watch as the fire climbed higher in the outer building. Funny how untended fuel caches could catch fire like that._

_Dean reached down and cupped Sam’s cheek and whispered. “I’m here for you Sammy. I’m here.” Sam whimpered behind his gag,_ _his face blank of expression,_ _and Dean was left to wonder if Sam even knew who he was. “It’s Dean, Sammy, your brother, I’m here to rescue you. Gotta get you out of these chains.” Sam’s whimpers eased at the sound of Dean’s voice, and Dean gently ran his hand down the side of Sam’s face where tears had left clean trails through the grime. Dean wasn’t sure his brother actually recognized him or if it was just his soothing tone, but his whimpers calmed. Dean gritted his teeth and set to work: his lock picks made short work of the manacles holding Sam’s hands in place. Once freed, Sam wrapped both arms tight around Dean’s legs, shivering in fear._

_Dean whispered, “Sammy, I’ve gotta free your legs, but I may not be able to hold you. You might be too big for me, bro. Get ready for a bumpy drop.”_

_Dean extracted himself from Sam’s hold and shifted over to the crank mechanism holding Sam in place. He unclasped the safety lock and braced himself to lower Sam’s full weight. His arms nearly pulled out of their sockets, but he was able to keep hold of the crank and slowly feed out the chain until Sam lay in a heap on the floor. As Dean approached, Sam tried to scuttle weakly away toward the wall. Whimpering behind his gag in fear, not a molecule of recognition in his eyes. He held his hands up in front of his face to ward off a blow, and Dean’s heart cracked. He knelt, hands held out wide in supplication and crooned softly at the broken man. “Shhh, Sammy, it’s just me, Dean. Ain’t gonna hurt you Sam, my Sammy. Want to get you out of here, man. Can you do that? Help me get you out of here? Please baby, be there enough for me now. I can’t do this on my own.”_

_Sam looked up at him and lowered his trembling arms. Sagged down onto the floor. Dean took that as a sign of agreement and shuffled forward, and pulled his brother gently into his arms._

_Outside the windows the factory grounds were erupting in conflagration, explosions going off in satisfying regularity as new drums caught fire. Dean's hands ghosted over his brother's bruised and battered body, assessing his injuries. He could see the fingerprints along Sam’s hips and he had to look away for a moment and close his eyes, swallow down his rage. Cuts and bruises littered his brother’s emaciated body, various stages of yellow and purple along with angry red stripes left behind by the leader’s whip. Dean quickly unbuckled Sam’s gag and threw it aside. He swallowed when he saw the rings in Sam’s nipples were red with infection. Sam whimpered again, and all Dean wanted to do right at that moment was to sit there with his arms around his wrecked and battered brother and rock him quiet and safe. Hold him till the hurt and fear went away. He couldn’t do that, though, there wasn't that kind of time. Holding Sam in one arm Dean swiftly wriggled off his pack and one handed yanked out clothing he’d brought for Sam._

_Dean rubbed Sam’s back soothingly and said, “Sam, Sam can you hear me? I-I need to get you dressed, get you out of here. Okay? Can you help me Sam? Do you think you can walk?”_

_It was like dressing a small child, or a large doll, Dean slipping first one arm, then the other into the flannel shirt. He coaxed Sam to stand and got him into the soft track pants, hearing Sam moan in pleasure as his icy skin was covered by the warm fabric._

_Dean cursed; he hadn’t thought of shoes. What had he been thinking? Trying to travel barefoot in October's chill could mean death. He had to do something to cover Sam's bare feet before they could leave._

_He felt eyes on him and whirled, knife ready, only to see that several of the slaves had left the window and were silently watching him with Sam._

_Rather than attempting to fight him, many were barely standing themselves, thin and beaten, several missing limbs; many so badly scarred they barely looked human anymore._

_“Go,” Dean whispered at the huddled group, “This is your chance, make a run for it. They’ll be busy with the fire for a while. GO!” Dean ordered. The slaves looked at Dean blankly, so broken they could no longer even comprehend escape; they just staggered back in fear of Dean’s voice. Then most of them wandered aimlessly back toward the windows. None of them, Dean noted sadly, even tried to leave._

_Dean rose and helped Sam to his feet, holding his brother’s thin frame around the waist._

_“Mister…wait.” Dean heard the squeak of a voice coming from the corner; it was the kid chained to the spit. “Mister, can you get me free?” Glancing round, to be sure the coast was still clear, Dean eased Sam down to sit on the leader’s throne for the moment, and hurried over to the kid. He picked the locks on the chain around the boy’s neck, and when the iron loop fell away, the boy stood a moment in shock, looking up at Dean in awe. “Thanks mister, I-I never thought I’d make it out of here alive.” Dean’s heart ached; he was only a teenager. He wished he could do more, but Dean couldn’t offer any more help, there was only room for one more on the bike and there was still Cas to deal with. “Yeah no problem. Hey, grab what you can and get out of here pronto, They’ll be back soon.” The kid stuck out a scrawny hand and Dean shook it. “And it’s Dean, not mister. ” Dean smiled, and the boy returned the smile, slowly, like his face hadn't been used to moving that way in a while. “Josh, my name's Josh, and thanks again I-I could see my turn comin’ soon on that spit,” the boy shuddered and started toward a back door, with purpose in his stride._

_“Wait, kid…Josh, hey, you know where I can get my brother some shoes?”_

_The boy, seventeen or eighteen if it was Dean’s guess, twitched nervously._

_“I-I gotta stash back here but they wouldn’t fit your brother. They-they keep the spare… clothes they take down in the locker. O-over there. But I wouldn’t go down there unless you have to….” The kid glanced over to a steel door at the side of the space._

_“Okay. Thanks, Josh, and good luck.”_

_The boy darted off, and Dean helped lift Sam back to his feet. As they made their way across the floor to the locker Dean stopped by the man pinned to the table. With a grunt Dean pulled the blades from the man’s hands and feet; demon strength having driven them in deep through bone into the wood beneath. The man moaned and curled on his side. Dean sighed, he wasn’t sure if he was even there anymore, let alone if he could walk. The flayed woman had mercifully died at some point while he was freeing Sam. Dean averted his eyes from the mutilated flesh._

_At the locker door Dean let Sam sag to the ground. Sam began to rock in agitation, his skinny arms wrapped around his knees. Dean knelt down beside Sam, pushed the dirty hair back from Sam's eyes and tried lifting his chin to force him to meet Dean's eyes. “Stay here Sammy, don’t move I’ll be right back.”_

_Sam’s blank gaze slid away without acknowledgment Dean sighed and stood._

_He threw back the heavy bolt on the door and looked inside, wondering why the bolt was on the outside. The entrance led to stairs going down. It was noticeably colder and a chill of fear ran up his spine. Dean wished he could just grab up his brother and run, but without shoes… He stiffened his spine; he was a hunter damnit, and this needed doing. He grabbed up a torch from the main room and stepped inside. The grated metal steps were slick and shiny; Dean could guess what they were wet with. At the bottom of the landing he saw a mound of bags and suitcases stacked haphazardly against one wall, and beside it a mountain of shoes and glasses. It was like a scene out of a concentration camp._

_Dean’s mind blanked at the implications, the sheer numbers; he jammed his torch into a bracket on one of the pipes and started to sift through the shoes. It was cold here, so cold, Dean could see his breath in the flickering light and there was a strange heavy smell like dried blood in the air, Dean couldn’t wait to leave. Eventually he came up with a heavy duty pair of hiking boots. He compared the footprint to his own and the larger size seemed a good match for his Sam._

_He quickly rooted through the suitcases and found a fleece-lined jacket with heavy gloves in the pocket. Not daring to stay longer Dean prepared to leave._

_As he started up the steps he heard a low, anguished moan. Dean paused, torn. He tried to force himself up the stairs; no part of him wanted to go deeper into that room._

_He swallowed and gave himself two minutes before he had to leave. He turned around and walked deeper into the locker. As he stepped around a pile of clothing, Dean wished there were things you could un-see. Running back so far his light didn’t go far enough to reach the end of the room were row upon row of bodies hung on hooks. Slabs of meat in cold storage, the demons very own slaughterhouse. Running the length of the room Dean could make out cot after cot lining the walls, cots filled with human-shaped figures., The low moan came from a man chained to a cot near the entrance. Dean stepped closer. In the wavering light he could see that one of the man’s arms and both of his legs below the knees had been crudely amputated._

_Fresh meat._

_Sickened to the depths of his soul, Dean looked into the pain-filled eyes and wished every demon here a swift trip back to hell. Chains rattled and the man’s hand scrabbled to grab Dean’s, an ugly garbling sound coming from his mouth and Dean dimly realized they’d cut out the man’s tongue._

_“I-I can’t save you. I-…” Dean whispered brokenly, his voice trailing off in horror. Other chained bodies moaned in the darkness. Dean stood rooted in place, overwhelmed by the hopeless realization washing over him in the face of this new nightmare. He was brought back to himself by the man’s hand as it squeezed his gently. Dean looked down and saw purpose in the pain filled eyes and the man nodded._

_Dean blinked in sudden understanding. He licked his lips and whispered apologetically, “I-I’ve never killed a man before.” Sorrow filled him and he felt his heart clench, what if this had been Sam’s fate? He doubted his ability to do this even now, even to grant the man's plea. This was a human being, no demon or hell spawn, an innocent. The man’s hand gently patted Dean’s and tears began to fall down Dean’s cheeks as he realized he couldn’t leave him here like this. Nothing but a grisly slow death before him, in torment and alone in the dark. He couldn’t risk a bullet though, couldn’t chance attracting attention to him and Sam._

_Dean put his stolen booty down and crouched by the man, he pulled the knife from its sheath and nodded at him. “You sure?” The man nodded and closed his eyes. Dean bit his lip and said, “On the count of three.” The man nodded wearily, “One…” Dean plunged the knife into the man’s heart in one swift sure blow. The man’s eyes snapped open in sudden pain and surprise, his body arcing up off of the bed in spasm, and in one gurgling breath it was over. Dean doubled over, heaving again, bile flooding his mouth. He couldn’t stop the tears running down his face._

_Dean fled the basement like the hounds of hell were after him, ignored the pain-filled moans of others deeper in the room. He could do no more, he’d reached his limit. He reached the main landing and fell sobbing at his brother’s feet, crying like a small, broken child as he breathed in the scent of Sam, Sammy, life. Later, he would remember thanking God, or whoever ran things now, that Sam had been spared this at least. He didn’t remember gathering up his brother or getting Sam into his new clothes and boots but he must have done that. He didn’t even remember taking out the guard on patrol when they neared the fence. He just remembered coming around standing over the body while Sam rocked and keened at his feet._

_Dean forced himself to snap out of it, the demons would start to look for the cause of the fire soon and they had to be gone. He pulled the wire cutters from their hiding place near the fence and sprinted toward Castiel. He dug in with the snippers, cutting and slicing away the bindings. He would have liked to be more careful but Sam’s presence and the blaring alarm that suddenly penetrated his awareness warned him his time was up. ._

_Another snip, and the angel sagged broken and nearly unrecognizable to the ground with a hard thump. Dean cut through the fence, enough to get them through, and shoved Sam under, wriggling through after him. He knelt beside the angel. Tried to gently roll him to his back. The ugly crunch of broken shattered wings like twigs crackling underfoot as he turned his friend sickened him._

_“Cas….Jesus.” Dean used his cutters to snap the chains holding his friend’s limbs and set about with his lock picks in the flickering light of the burning compound to loosen his rune-covered manacles. He felt the power of the dark magics thrumming through them and couldn’t wait to toss them aside as they came free. The last lock to pick was the heavy metal collar on Cas’s neck._

_As the weight of the collar slipped from his friend’s torn and bloody neck, Cas began to glow softly. The angel turned his ruined eyes towards him and his voice emerged on a thread of air, “Dean, my friend… RUNNN.”_

_Dean didn’t question, didn’t argue, just scooped up his brother’s hand and began to run for the forest surrounding the factory. Dean could feel a burning heat as the glow increased behind him. He didn’t look back. By the time they made it into the woods, there was a sudden thunderclap and a flash of light. When the thermonuclear glow died down, Dean squinted into the early morning light. The factory was leveled, there was nothing left but a large cratered hole in the ground._

_Dean had no sense of Castiel’s presence in the blackened land. He wasn’t sure if he’d just witnessed an angel’s death or its vengeance. All he knew was he had his brother back._

: : :


	4. The Winchester Road

 

  


  


: : :

Sam’s cough was worsening. As they lay huddled in the back seat of an abandoned car that night Dean could feel the fever's heat as it raged through his brother’s body. Even the new clothes weren’t enough to warm him, to stop the fine tremors that rippled through Sam’s emaciated limbs. Dean knew he had to find shelter, a roof, real heat, maybe some antibiotics, or all the new winter coats in the world wouldn’t save them.

: : :

Despairing of any better idea, the next morning Dean decided to cut across country. All the homes along the main road were well picked over, and heavily patrolled by cavenger crews. To find someplace safe enough to stop for a while it would need to be out of the way, off the beaten track.

The first house they found had no roof. Or rather it had a roof, but the charred remains now lay inside its sagging walls. Dean eased Sam down to sit on the remaining porch.

“Stay here Sam, I’m gonna look around and see if there's anything usable.” Dean wasn’t hopeful, and a quick patrol around the property confirmed his expectations. The only good thing to come out of it was the discovery of an old pump. Dean used the last of their water to prime it and they were rewarded with fresh icy cold spring water. He found a bucket, tapped out the trash and loose dirt, rinsed it several times, before and after scrubbing it with one of their clean rags, then filled it again and used one of their precious purifying tablets. Dean then refilled all their canteens from it and they both took long drinks of the sweet liquid before they set back down the dirt road.

It was getting late and Sam’s coughing had increased, two spots of color high on his cheeks. Dean he knew they’d be forced to stop soon. He didn’t know what made him take a second look, a weird hunch or some kind of sixth sense, but he thought he saw the faint outline of a weathervane in the distance amongst the branches of the dead trees.

“Come on Sammy, I’m feelin’ lucky.” He hugged his brother and set them off across the barren field with Dean’s arm still firmly wrapped around Sam’s overheated body.

Dean couldn’t quite believe their luck; an old farmhouse sat pristine and relatively undisturbed behind a copse of dead trees, well hidden from the road. He checked the perimeter and saw no signs of life, no signs for a long, long time.

It was almost a full hour of watching before Dean decided the house was safe. They entered together, Dean sweeping the interior first, then settling Sam on the old battered couch still in the living room. Dean hummed in approval, not bad, not bad at all. There were even a few miscellaneous canned goods in the pantry and curtains on the windows; they could hole up here until Sammy was better. Dean moved around the main floor closing all the curtains and blinds and got a fire started in the old fireplace. The flue still worked and soon a cheery blaze burned, warming the room significantly. Dean listened to Sammy’s labored breathing as he set up for supper.

He went upstairs looking for bedding or blankets and found two bedrooms pretty much stripped down, but the mattresses were still in good repair. He chose the larger one, a queen, horsing it down the hall and stairwell to land on the floor in front of the fire. Sam looked up, a dull fevered look in his eyes, and slumped back onto the chesterfield. Dean’s mouth tightened with worry and he ran back up stairs to grab the few blankets he’d found.

He laid Sam out on the mattress wrapped in the soft blankets and checked the tins he’d left to heat by the fire. He fed Sam the last of their beans and chili; tried to spoon as much into his brother as he could before Sam fell asleep on him. He could feel the trembling in his brother’s limbs subsiding, but he worried at the bright pink of his cheeks and the whistling wheeze of his labored breathing. What Dean wouldn’t give for some amoxicillin or even aspirin right now.

He wet a cloth and laid it over his brother’s forehead in an attempt to get the fever down. Sam moaned in his sleep tossing his head knocking the cloth aside.

Frustrated by his inability to help, Dean snatched up his shotgun to do a patrol around the house. It was nearly dark. It would be a final chance to check things out before nightfall.

Walking the perimeter, his foot snagged on something and he tripped. He cursed as he shook out the ankle and wiggled the toe in his leaky, damp boot. Damn, he couldn't afford to cripple himself on a – huh. He bounced again, easy. When he'd hopped, the ground beneath him felt spongy – bouncy. He eased off to the side, where the ground wasn't springy, and crouched down to sweep a hand over the suspiciously smooth surface. It was almost a full sheet of plywood somebody had left lying in the middle of the yard. He eased his fingers under the edge, cautiously lifting it enough to tell it wasn't attached to anything beneath it. He bent down, peering between the bottom surface and the ground, making sure it wasn't wired to anything, like explosives, a booby-trap for whoever might come raiding in the last days before this place was abandoned. Satisfied, he lifted the plywood up and tossed it over, upside down – it never hurt to be sure – and revealed a circular piece of metal about eighteen inches across, with a handle – like a lid to an underground container of some sort.

Dean studied the handle for a minute or two, and finally shrugged and reached out to give it a turn. There was resistance, but it did give, and as he continued to turn it, there was a soft, sucking sound of the release of a seal. He continued to turn the handle till the lid shifted, just a little, in place. Gingerly, slowly, he lifted the lid an inch at a time, squinting around the edge in the dusk to see that there were no obvious wires or sensors. He got his hand, and then his arm underneath, reaching to sweep the whole underside with careful fingers. When he found nothing but smooth painted metal with a simple wire loop handle in the center, he eased the hatch open. It stopped on its own, just past perpendicular; it wouldn't be blowing shut by accident.

Dean peered down, it was intimidatingly black inside, the air stale. He lit his cigarette lighter and tried to see in the gloom. With his luck he suspected he'd just stumbled on to an old fuel storage or sewage tank – but there was no detectable odor of either – or of anything else, for that matter. The square shapes of stacked boxes came murkily into view, and Dean drew in a surprised breath.

Glancing furtively around to make sure there was no one watching, he decided to take a chance and climb down inside.

He thought he’d have to leap down, but there was a narrow metal ladder just under the lip of the entrance. Dean climbed down and panned his lighter around, sucking in a breath in shock.

Surrounding him, lining the walls, and every conceivable space, were supplies: food, giant jugs of water, boxes of dry goods and camping equipment. Stunned, Dean walked down past a row of shelves on one side of the shelter – can after can after can of rations. He turned and there at the end of the aisle, the end of the shelter was a double wide cot equipped with a real mattress and clean sheets and blankets stacked up on one corner and on the other side, more supplies. What caught Dean’s eye, though, was the red first aid kit. He scrambled over to it, opening it with shaking hands. Inside, new, sealed packets of sterile wipes and band aids and antibiotics of several flavors. Dean clenched a bottle in his hands and whispered out a prayer and turned to dash up to Sam. He paused just long enough to grab up a couple of more random cans of food and stuff them inside his jacket, climbing the ladder almost giddy with relief and as strangely unfamiliar emotion. It might have been hope.

: : :

They picnicked late that night before the fire. Dean had coaxed several of the tablets down Sam’s throat and the effects were almost immediate. The hectic red began to leach from his cheeks, and the sweats and nightmares subsided. When Sam’s eyelids fluttered open late in the night Dean was beside him in an instant with a cool drink.

“Hey, Sammy, hey buddy, how you doing? Better?” Sam seemed more present, his eyes focusing on Dean before he nodded mutely and tried to sit up.

“Here’ I’ll help you. I got us a surprise. You hungry?”

Sam took a moment, eyes dropping down seeming to assess if he was hungry or not. Dean’s eyes widened in surprise, this was as ‘here’ as Sam had ever been. Slowly, his brother looked up at him and nodded. A smile broke over Dean’s face.

“Have I got a treat for you. Close your eyes and open your mouth.” Sam looked a bit puzzled at the order but obeyed his brother trustingly, leaning back his head and opening his mouth. Dean was reminded of a baby bird as he slipped the treat between chapped lips, and Sam’s eyes snapped open in surprise.

“Good, right? Am I right?” Sam looked at him bewildered and pleased as he began to chew the sweet soft piece of fruit in his mouth. His eyelids fluttered closed in pleasure at the long-forgotten taste of peach, and Sam moaned.

“Here look, peaches, and corned beef – and pickles!!! My god when did I ever think I’d be excited by a pickle? And there’s more where that came from Sammy, so eat all you want. No limits, man!

Sam gestured suspiciously at Dean, and Dean chuckled, pointing at opened and emptied tins. “I’ve already stuffed myself Sam, don’t you worry.”

Dean sat back, his back against the fireplace mantle, watching in pleasure as his brother sampled everything on the plate Dean had offered him, savoring the nearly forgotten tastes and textures.

They slept together that night, curled up warm and comfortable on the mattress, content and full for the first time in recent memory.

: : :

The next day Dean plied Sammy with more antibiotics, built up the fire and left him with strict orders not to do anything but rest, and headed out to explore his find. The bunker entrance had been hidden by the debris and overlooked by anybody who had come looking since the place was abandoned. Dean’s second look inside left him more impressed than the first: it was a survivalist's treasure trove. Dean had no idea why it had gone unused, but nothing inside had ever been touched, aside from regular replacement. Dean knew the habits of people who kept such caches – they circulated old stuff out regularly, replacing it with new. All the sell-by dates here were current or future, even the antibiotics. The only items missing off the tidily ordered racks were the few tins Dean had snatched the night before. Dean spent an hour going through and itemizing in his head the items in the shelter, and when he was done he sank onto the bunk a little stunned. There was easily enough food to see them through the winter. They could stop, take a real break. Sam could get healthy, maybe put on a little weight. It was not like they had anywhere to be. This time even Dean had to admit the world was beyond saving, so why not kick back and enjoy the bounty they’d been given?

Every box Dean opened held more priceless treasure, from clothing to shoes. There were even several pairs of hiking boots, sturdy and warm and summer sneakers – pairs big enough for both of them, even Sam’s ginormous feet. One shelf held a variety of books, mostly adult, but a few picture books, and Dean brought those down for Sam to look at and laid them on the bed.

Dean’s instinct was to move them into the shelter. It had been hard enough for Dean to spot the bunker entrance the next morning even knowing where it was, and with the hatch sealed from the inside, they would be safe at night. There was even a separate ventilation shaft for air and a small organic toilet. Worse case, they could hole up here for weeks without sticking their noses out.

Dean moved their packs and belongings from the house and helped ease Sam down the ladder. He ensconced him on the big double bed at the back, and Sam’s eyes went wide at the largess surrounding them. Dean worked his way through the house obscuring all evidence of their stay, even returning the mattress upstairs. He combed through the dwelling and removed all remaining tins of food; he didn’t want an excuse for visitors to linger if they did manage to stumble on the farm. He even found more children’s books in the second bedroom; it would be a long winter and distractions like these would be good for Sam. He attached the plywood permanently to the bunker hatch, so the opening was camouflaged at all times when the hatch was sealed. And the wire loop handle on the inside of the lid was more than just a pull handle; turned clockwise a quarter turn, it secured the latch. Turned clockwise a further quarter turn, it overrode the outside latch, preventing it from working. Someone had definitely been thinking siege. Dean fretted a bit – if they'd been staying permanently, or even a little longer, he would like to have rigged a periscope-type deal, to make sure the coast was clear before he opened that hatch and popped his head out. But isolated as they were, he put his fears aside and made himself be happy and grateful with what they did have.

It was gratifying to see Sam improve; the fever and sweats fell away completely by the second day thanks to the antibiotics. Every day there was more life in his Sammy’s eyes, and good food and warmth seemed to agree with his boy. Dean caught Sam smiling and laughing more than since… before. Several days after Sam’s recovery, and with no visitors spotted anywhere near the house, Dean decided it was time for a bath.

He found a metal bucket, and lugged bucket after bucket of cold water up the stairs to the bathroom and set, one after another, to boil on the little gas burner he’d found in the bunker. Steam soon filled the room from the bubbling water in the big stew pot he’d scrounged from the kitchen. He’d carefully scrubbed the bathroom to spotless and set up an assembly line of warming water as he gradually filled the tub.

Next he had to convince Sam to strip down. The little bathroom was warm by then and as Sam reluctantly shed his clothes, Dean wept at the sight of his brother’s damaged flesh. Scars and shiny patches scarred Sam’s back and thighs, there were burn marks that would never completely fade on his arms and groin. Dean made his brother crouch in the old claw foot tub as he poured warm water over him. He picked up a soft new washcloth and rubbed fine, sweet smelling soap over his brother’s shoulders. Sam tipped his head back and moaned at the sensation. Dean took the opportunity to pour soap into his brother’s greasy locks and started to massage off the first layer of grime. Two more rinses and repeats, and Dean was able to leave a relatively clean Sam alone to soak in the tub. He even found a small yellow rubber duck in the cabinet under the bathroom sink, and Sam played with it, ducking it under the now clean sudsy water. While his brother played, Dean started the procession of water lugging and heating all over again for his own bath.

When Sammy’s water had started to go cold and his brother lay sleepy eyed and content in the bath, half submerged he swayed his head back and forth in the water his shaggy hair drifting peacefully around him. Dean smiled at his merman brother and tapped him gently on the shoulder, vivid hazel eyes reluctantly opening to regard him curiously. He pulled out a soft, fuzzy, never used towel and urged him up and into its folds. He gently patted the damp locks dry, rubbing the towel until his hair stood on end sticking up in all directions like a wet puppy. Dean dried behind Sam’s ears, and Sam giggled as Dean found a ticklish spot. He patted the towel down Sam’s long length and took in the gaunt hollowed-out frame and felt rage burn through him anew at the sight of the scarred skin.

When he was done he wrapped Sam in a fresh towel and left him snoozing in a corner of the warm bathroom while he repeated the cleansing ritual himself. He was on his second rinse when he jerked in surprise as Sam’s long strong hand gently eased the washcloth from his hand. Sam slowly and carefully slid the cloth over Dean’s back, scrubbing at the ingrained dirt. Dean bit his lip against the emotion that flooded him as his brother interacted with him voluntarily. Sam finished Dean’s back and with a shy nod gave Dean back his cloth and retreated to his pile of towels squeaking his ducky as Dean submerged himself for the third and last time. Together they donned fresh clean clothes Dean had put out for both of them. The last thing Dean did was dig out scissors and the fresh pack of razors he’d found in the bunker, and set about trimming both their beards.

Sam cringed back in fear, uttering a high-pitched whine, and Dean’s heart broke to think what the demons might have done with blades or razors to cause such a reaction. “Shhh Sammy, not gonna hurt you, just gonna take off that beard. Look watch me.”

Sam watched fascinated as Dean first snipped away at the scraggly beard. Sam’s eyes never left him, and when Dean turned and said, “your turn Sammy, see that didn’t hurt.” He whimpered a little in fear, but sat bravely as his brother trimmed back the dark scruff close to the skin. “There now, will you look at that? See that didn’t hurt.” Dean smiled into the mirror and Sam, watching Dean, smiled a soft shy smile back. Next, Dean sprayed out a generous dollop of shaving cream on his hand and ran it over the stubble. Sam’s pink tongue darted out as he watched the blade cut slowly through the beard, leaving smooth, pink skin behind. “See Sammy, see how handsome I am without a beard?” Dean’s smirk was met with raised eyebrows as Sam earnestly nodded his mute approval. Sam leaned in and Dean’s heart swelled at the trust Sam was showing him. Dean lathered him up, putting an extra dollop of spray foam on Sam’s nose. The cross eyed look Sam gave the foam made Dean laugh out loud. Dean first shaved a section of his own face then Sam’s, alternated back and forth between them until they were both as clear and smooth as a baby’s butt. Sam hummed his approval at the mirror and tilted his head back trustingly for Dean to take the long run down his jawline.

Sam surprised Dean by reaching out for the razor. Dean shrugged and thought what the hell, but he couldn't help cautioning, “Careful of the neck, huh Sammy?”

Sam’s long strong fingers grasped the razor awkwardly then moved it around in his hand till muscle memory had him holding it more confidently. He tilted Dean’s chin back and the razor did a slow careful glide up along Dean’s neck. Dean grinned in approval when Sam looked at him with worried eyes, offering him the razor back. “Hell no, Sammy, you’re doing great. Keep going.” Sam shyly ducked his head but continued to shave Dean, a contented hum filling the room.

When they were both shaved and washed off, Dean packed up all their supplies and headed back to the bunker. Sam’s bright smile was reward enough for Dean. That night after supper they curled together on the bed and Sam dug out his book and offered it to Dean.

Dean grinned. “Been a while since we read this, huh Sammy? I think that’s a good choice for this evening’s entertainment. You want to read it tonight?”

Sam shyly shook his head and lay down beside Dean, propping his face up in Dean’s lap to see the book better. As of old, Dean stretched his arms out around so he could encompass his brother and still reach the edges of the book.

“Alrighty then, here we go….

I do not like them in a box.

I do not like them with a fox.

I do not like them in a house.

I do not like them with a mouse…”

 

That winter proved an idyllic time, a restful time for the two Winchesters weary of the road. As the harsh winter winds howled around them, they were content to stay in the bunker, often not coming up for days if the weather was particularly brutal. Dean slowly worked his way through the shelves of books in the bunker, reading to Sam each night, including ‘The Book.’ He tried on occasion to teach Sam to read again with the few children’s primers, but Sam’s attention skittered away and he withdrew. Dean didn’t like to push. His brother had been through so much already. Just being able to lie beside him as they slept squished up together on the double mattress; their two long bodies making the bed seem small was more than Dean would have ever thought to have again. The feel of Sam’s floppy hair under his chin as he nestled into the crook of Dean’s shoulder, the soft scent that was pure Sammy as Dean spooned up behind him in sleep was enough. Sam was safe, and Dean allowed himself to relax into that knowledge at least for the next little while.

On three occasions Dean had them run silent when he thought he heard voices from above, but they sat it out and never ran into a living soul. Dean didn’t want to think about how they might have survived out on the road in the shape they were in when they had found their sanctuary. He just counted their blessings and enjoyed their respite from the harsh reality of outside. In the spring, with supplies running low, Dean decided it was time to hit the road. Both of them had put on weight. Though still slim, they each had a healthy glow that only regular diet and rest could produce. Dean picked through their remaining supplies and again thanked whatever luck had guided them to this place, as they loaded up their packs with as much as they could carry, and headed out toward the coast.

: : :

It happened so suddenly. One minute they were threading their way through abandoned cars on the deserted interstate, and the next minute Dean was lying flat on his back.

The arrow came out of nowhere, no warning, nothing. Dean grunted and looked down at his side where the feathered end of a hunting arrow sprouted out of his chest. He staggered backward, only Sam grabbing him by the side and lowering him to the ground stopped him from falling.

A surprised voice drifted over the cars, “I got him, I think I got him Jed.”

Dean groaned and stared up at the sky a few dread clouds spotted its uniform greyness today.

This was not the way he saw himself going out.

“Sam, Sammy.” Sam was sitting beside him keening softly hands fluttering over Dean, helpless. “Help me to my feet Sam, we gotta get away from these fuckers.”

Sam helped Dean to stand. As soon as the dizziness passed Dean risked a quick glance in the direction of the voices. Several car lengths camouflaged at first glance by stacked boxes and debris two men were encamped atop an old RV motor home. Even from here Dean could make out the black of their eyes as they began to climb down off their perch. The men looked so similar. Dean figured the demons must have taken over the bodies of brothers.

Dean didn’t think, he just turned and was running down the abandoned car lengths, Sam’s hand and his in a death grip. He heard the sound of footsteps slapping on the pavement behind them and knew the demons were trailing after them like hyenas scenting blood, whooping and yelling as they tried to flush them out. Dean zigged to the other side of the pavement and as they passed a crumpled and burnt 18 wheeler, Dean saw a small opening in the bent and folded storage compartment. He quickly ducked his head in – it was just big enough for Sammy.

He turned to his brother, gasping as the arrow moved inside him, and pushed his brother into the compartment. “Stay here Sam, and for god's sake, stay down.” Dean cupped Sam’s shoulder for emphasis and to help him duck down into the cavity. He fought the wave of dizziness as he started to move again. Demon blade in hand, he backtracked a bit, staying out of the brothers' sight, moved to the opposite side of the road now, and threw some rocks further away from the RV. Then he sidled along the cars back up toward the RV. The two continued to yell and shoot several arrows into the parked cars in an effort to scare their prey into moving into the open. Dean prayed Sammy would stay down, stay safe. He got into position at the front of the RV and undid the gas cap. He inhaled deeply and let a feral grin spread across his face as the fumes met his nose. He quickly ripped a strip off his torn and bloody t-shirt and stuffed it in the opening. Snapping open his lighter with a satisfying click, he lit the end of the cloth, made sure it was well caught, and then went to hide. In no time at all the cotton was ablaze, and those flames were disappearing into the opening. Even prepared for it, Dean didn’t expect quite the breadth of the pyrotechnics he’d unleashed as the RV seemed to swell and then visibly launch itself into the air several feet before landing in flames. Dean watched from his hiding place as the two demons turned and came running back to the fire, forgetting cover in their shock, and in clear view. As the demons stood watching their motor home burn, Dean was able to creep out of hiding and get close enough to plunge the demon blade deep into the back of one of the men. The satisfying squeal and rush of wind as fire snapped and the black cloud hurled itself out of the man’s body had Dean staggering back, grinning. In his other hand he held his pearl handled revolver he’d somehow managed to hang on to, and aimed it squarely at the remaining demon brother with the compound bow.

“All right, don’t move. I’ve got the drop on you. Drop the bow.” Dean ordered in his gruffest voice. Dean wiped a trickle of sweat along his face onto his jacket. His hand was shaking, his chest hurt like hell, and the arrow was a dull ache in it. He had to keep Sam safe.

“Dean Winchester…. We’ve been looking for you.” The demon advanced, not the least bit fazed by the gun in Dean’s hand. Dean shoved it into his belt at the back of his pants and took a firmer grip on the blade.

“Since the boss left, there’s been a real good price on your head. Nice to see I won’t have to split it with anyone now, thanks to you.” The demon nodded toward his dead partner.

“Stay back you fucker. I’ll kill ya.” Dean wiped at more sweat obscuring his vision. His arm was getting so heavy and beginning to shake. The demon kept advancing and Dean tried to circle around it, swiping his blade, but the man danced easily out of reach. The demon lunged, and Dean swung in, realizing too late he’d been suckered, and suddenly the demon had an arm around his neck and was knocking the knife out of his hand as he shoved Dean into a nearby car. Dean watched defeated, in the flickering flames of the burning RV as the demon blade slid across the asphalt and into the dark.

The demon slammed Dean back into the car, holding him by the neck; Dean’s hands scrabbled like wild things trying to pry the super strong creature away from him. The demon’s free hand came round and cruelly twisted the arrow embedded in Dean’s chest and he cried out in agony, writhing in pain in the demon’s hold as he felt the arrow inside him crack. Everything was getting darker, and Dean realized he was passing out, or maybe dying, as the demon continued to squeeze his neck. Dean’s last thought was that at least Sam was safe, maybe he would have enough sense to sneak away. Dean gurgled and felt the world falling away.

Suddenly the demon in front of him screamed, his hand loosening from around Dean’s neck as he threw back his head and shimmered in a crackling glow, the demon knife projecting from the middle of his chest. As it slumped to the ground the scream of wind as the black cloud exited his body, Dean could vaguely make out Sam standing there. His eyes were wild, and ‘there’ and for a moment it was like Sam of old, his Sam with him, fighting together, hunting things, the family business. His shoulders proud, half crouched stance, the knife held confidently in his hand. As the demon’s head lolled lifeless on the ground he pushed back the hair from his face and looked over at Dean, fierce with anger and purpose written all over his face.

Dean slumped down following the edge of the broken down Chevy he had been pinned against. He barely had the strength to whisper out “Sammy,” before he passed out.

Dean woke disoriented. He was lying on a bed on his side – and how were they back at the old farmhouse? A large hand cupped his head, and fingers started to run softly through his hair. Dean’s head was resting in Sam’s lap and, searching the surroundings, he realized that he was inside the darkened shell of an old cube van Sam must have found. They were still on the Interstate then. An old mattress and a camp lantern tricked out the inside of the vehicle. The arrow was sticking out of his side, and it felt like living flame.

“Sammy, water.”

Sam eased Dean’s head onto a pillow – where had he gotten a pillow? – as he carefully slid out from behind him on the bed. He hurried over to their packs stacked in the corner of the cargo area and brought one of their canteens up to Dean’s lips. Concerned hazel eyes looked into his, and Sammy’s brow furrowed as he watched Dean drink. Salt trails lined Sam’s cheeks where he had been crying, and Sam clutched his book to his chest like a shield, rocking back and forth on his heels waiting for Dean to finish with the canteen. The burn in Dean’s lungs almost had him spitting it all back up; the burn in Dean’s soul as he recognized the return of the lost, childlike look in Sam’s face hurting twice as much.

Dean bit his lip to suppress the moan, as he tried to keep the water down. The arrow had caught a part of his lung and went clear through. This was so not good. “Bring me the little camp stove Sammy, and my knife.”

: : :

They had curved back toward the ocean, some misguided sense of Dean’s that if they were near the sea, somehow things would be better. They still had a few cans left in their pack from the bunker, and scavenging up till then among the abandoned farmhouses had been good. Dean shuddered to think what it must be like in the cities. Give him the wide open countryside any day.

With Dean wounded there was no easy way to scavenge now. Dean didn’t trust Sam out of his sight, and he was too weak to thoroughly scout prospective sites safely, so they ran on their existing rations. Since their run-in with the demon brothers they hadn’t seen another living soul, but Dean was taking no chances. Sam watched him with worried eyes.

He made it as far as the sea.

Dean lay on the edge of the ocean dozing lightly. Sam had brought blankets and mounded them up over and around him, and Dean lay nestled in the warm cocoon, panting a little for breath.

Sam kept glancing anxiously over at the knapsack and Dean realized the time was fast approaching. He’d tried, he’d tried so very hard and it had all come to this, to failure. He glanced up at the leaden sky once more and bid a silent prayer to whatever God or angels that might be still up there to watch out over his brother, as he would no longer be able to do.

  
“Bring me the book, Sammy” Dean gasped, the taste of blood in his mouth, and he arched up a little in pain as shards of the arrow’s shaft moved inside him. He'd pushed the head on through his body and talked Sam through breaking/cutting it off behind Dean, so that he could pull the shaft back out the way it had gone in. Sealing the wound with the hot kiss of the demon blade, but there must have been pieces that broke off inside him, they didn't get it all. And what they'd missed was killing him. He could feel his lung slowly filling up, being crushed, it was getting harder and harder to breathe.

He panted a little and tried to save his strength.

Sam dug into his knapsack and retrieved the battered book. Reverently he handed it to Dean and curled up, childlike, at Dean’s side.

Dean looked over at Sam, his strong, beautiful, broken brother, and reached up to gently brush the overlong hair from Sam’s eyes. The beatific childlike smile that transformed Sam’s face almost broke him.

He railed inside, he couldn’t die! Who would look after Dean’s brother, who would care for Sam if Dean were gone? His gaze panned out over the dead grey water, so still, so calm, and Dean felt his rage drain from him; fatigue as vast as the ocean before him settled in. He was so tired of fighting – and what had it ever gained him? Nothing. Everyone around him dead or dying.

Sam carefully opened the book, his overlarge hands gentle with the frayed binding, and passed it to Dean as he curled up on his lap, wrapping his big frame into Dean’s smaller one.

The lurid red cover was long faded now with wear and tear and water stains to a soft rose, the cartoon character on it reduced to a smudgy blur. Dean didn’t need to look at the book to recite it, but he did, grasping it in his trembling hands. This time though Sam moved to position himself behind Dean, nestling him against the crook of his arm, carefully reaching around until Dean’s hands entwined with Sam’s larger ones to help hold the volume in place. Dean sagged gratefully into Sam’s hold, rested his head against the greatly diminished bulk of his brother’s chest. Sam knew the words too, all fifty of them. Fifty words that encapsulated everything. More words than Sam could say.

“I do not like them in a box.

I do not like them with a fox.

I do not like them in a house.

I do not like them with a mouse.

I do not like them here or there. ”

Dean started to cough and Sam’s tightening grip around him almost broke him. He looked up and stared into Sam’s eyes, the sincere green blue watching him so earnestly. Dean bit back the sob that strangled his breathing and felt the slow trickle of a tear run down his cheek. He gazed down at the illustration of green eggs and it all felt slightly ludicrous all of a sudden. He looked up at Sam with a smirk on his face. “Come on Sam, let’s finish this.” He reached up and with a thin shaking hand brushed the tear off of Sam’s cheek and let his knuckles graze gently down Sam’s face. Sam’s brow wrinkled in concern and Dean swallowed and took a shallow panting breath before beginning to read again.

“I do not like them anywhere.

I do not like green eggs and ham.

I do not like them, Sam I am.”

Dean’s voice trained off toward the end. A shuddering breath, a sigh, then silence.

 

Sam sat beside his still brother and watched the unchanging sea.

 

 

 

Waited to hear the faint rustle of wings that would come and make everything right.

He was not disappointed.

Sam smiled.

 

 

: : :

FIN

**Comments Immensely appreciated no matter when you read this story. ^^**

Fic writers work for comments and I'd like to at least make minimum wage, especially for this story it's one of my favourites : )

**Author's Note:**

> A/N and Acknowledgments: What can I say except thank you to all the dear friends I tortured to help make me a better writer and make this a better story. My evil partners in crime anniespinkhouse (LJ username) and sylsdarkplace (LJ) for their encouragement and ongoing support. I especially doff my hat to fufaraw (LJ) who’s many edits, lovely grace notes that they are vastly improved this story.
> 
> A/N 2: I thought I should mention that writing this was inspired by a search khandromakoan did on our wonderfully irreplaceable spnstoryfinders for an SPN version of _The Road_ , which I was surprised to see no one had done yet. I could only offer a reference to the spectacular adaption of _The Book of Eli_ by selecasharp (LJ) for spn_cinema (LJ) called _The Book of Winchester ___which totally blew me away it is so good. If you haven't read it do yourself a favour and run on over and give it a read. Post-apocalytic fun at it's best!
> 
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> **So any comments, thoughts? Did I make you cry? You can tell me, it'll be just our secret ^^**

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] The Winchester Road | written by meus_venator](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7769815) by [Tipsy_Kitty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tipsy_Kitty/pseuds/Tipsy_Kitty)




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